


Shore Leave

by RPGwrites



Series: One Woman Show [4]
Category: Mass Effect - All Media Types, Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Angst, F/M, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-12
Updated: 2020-12-12
Packaged: 2021-03-10 22:27:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,307
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28024701
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RPGwrites/pseuds/RPGwrites
Summary: The war is happening and everyone feels the effect of it. Especially James and Shepard. Shepard makes some mulled wine and plans to share it with James.
Relationships: Female Shepard/James Vega
Series: One Woman Show [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1836751
Comments: 10
Kudos: 5





	Shore Leave

**Author's Note:**

> Prompted by [ MissMeggo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissMeggo). Prompt: Mulled wine.
> 
> Many thanks to [ thedarkpoet](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thedarkpoet/) for betaing.

Shepard was proud of herself. She’d gotten to work and made the mulled wine in time for the day, just as Ellen Ryder taught her. Everything was ready for her and James to spend some time together. She’d even asked him not to go anywhere for shore leave. 

He’d just shrugged his shoulders. Normally he would've given her a strange look and asked why, knowing she was up to something. But not this time. James had been gloomy these last few weeks. 

Shepard understood. She felt it too. They all did. The war was weighing on all of their shoulders, and it wasn't getting any better.

Shepard sighed as she left the room and took the elevator to the shuttle bay. Hopefully drinking some mulled wine and spending time with each other would do them both some good. 

* * *

When the elevator stopped, the doors opened to a James Vega doing pull ups. Unlike the previous time, he didn't have a shirt on. Why, she couldn't say. 

"Hey," he grunted between pull-ups when she came closer, "Came to check out the view?"

Shepard snorted, "By now you should know I didn’t." 

"What's up Lola?" 

"Can you stop for a moment? We need to talk."

He jumped off the rail and rubbed his hands. While he put on a shirt he said,"Sounds serious. Everything okay?"

"Yeah. I just thought since it's shore leave and all that, maybe we can spend some time together."

"Isn't that what we're doing right now?" he questioned. She looked to see if he was joking but she couldn't find any evidence. There was no raised eyebrow or a smirk. 

She placed her hands on her hips. "So what? You want to spend your shore leave doing pull-ups while talking to me?"

He shrugged, "What's wrong with that? Working out keeps the mind occupied."

That's when Shepard understood. James wanted to keep his mind busy. He was distracting himself from what was going on in the Galaxy. She couldn't blame him of course, though that didn't seem healthy for him. But she wouldn't tell him that. 

"You're not serious," she said instead, "I can think of at least 10 ways you can spend it better than that."

"Look Lola," James was all serious. No jokes. "We all have our ways to forget what's going on out there."

"We're doing something about that James. We're fighting back." 

"But is it enough?"

Shepard couldn't find it in herself to answer. 

* * *

Shepard sighed as she got into the elevator again. This time she would bring the mulled wine to James and hopefully they could enjoy it together.    


When she arrived at her destination she grabbed the bottle and two wine classes and took the elevator again, hoping that this time things would go according to plan. 

She expected to see James doing pull-ups again but this time he was tinkering with something at the workstation. 

As soon as he saw her a frown appeared on his features. "I'm not interested in drinking Lola." 

Shepard sighed as she placed the bottle on the desk. "It's mulled wine. I made it."

"Mulled wine?" James raised an eyebrow. 

"You know, spiced wine."

His raised eyebrow stayed and he crossed his arms across his chest. "I thought you weren’t a wine drinker."

Shepard shrugged her shoulders, "I'm not, but this was a family tradition."

"The Shepards or…" James knew there were parts of her past she didn't like to talk about. 

"The Ryders. Ellen, the twins’ mom - she used to make mulled wine. She taught me and when I was older we would drink it on Christmas as the kids drank hot chocolate."

James nodded his head slowly, "Sounds like a nice family tradition. You usually share it with your crew?" 

"No," she smiled, "Just with you." Shepard poured the warm red wine in the two glasses.

As she handed one glass toward him he frowned. "I don't know, Shepard."

"It's just mulled wine. It won't bite. I promise." She gave him a wink as he took the glass. 

He sniffed the wine, studying it. Shepard frowned at the sight before her.

"You never had it before?"

"Nah, Uncle wasn't a mulled wine kind of guy. Me neither. I'm not planning to be one now."

"Don't worry Vega. I'm not planning to make you one. Just sharing a family tradition with you."

"So," he said after studying his glass, "What are we toasting on?"

"Here's to defeating the reapers." She clinked her glass with James but he just stood stoically still. 

"What?" Shepard said. She’d had enough of his stare. 

"Look - I don't know if we'll ever defeat them." 

Shepard sighed as she put her glass down. "I know. To be honest I'm tired of playing this optimistic role; but we have to."

James took a sip and nodded his head at his wine but didn't comment on it. "If you're so pessimistic about all of this, then why pretend?"

"Because we need to keep people's faith up. Believe me, everyday I want to give up, but I can't afford to. It would be so nice to just let go."

James took another sip. Maybe just to distract himself from the conversation. "I don't know how you do that. Hearing about the death toll it's just…"

"...Unbearable?" She asked, finishing his sentence. "I know. Everyday I feel like I'm failing. But I can't give up now."

"Why not?"

Shepard sighed. She didn't know if she had an answer for him. "There's a lot of people depending on me. The truth is I won't give the reapers the satisfaction."

"I get that Lola." James slid down to sit on the floor, and Shepard joined him. 

"What's really going on James? I'm trying to be here, but I can't if you don't let me in." She interlocked her fingers with his, hoping it would reassure him.

"I don't know after Thessia… All those people died. And because they couldn’t hear us over a damn comm we couldn't help them. They were slaughtered and we had to hear them dying. Those screams…"

Shepard understood. More than she could say. She was there and they had lost everything. And worse, it was all for nothing. "I know." There was no comfort Shepard could give him. "But we need to carry on. We can't let their sacrifices be in vain."

"I wish it was that simple."

* * *

Shepard and James kept on talking and ended up drinking the whole bottle of mulled wine between them. Their conversation became less and less gloomy.

"So," James said as he put his glass down, "How was it with the Ryders?"

Shepard smiled as she remembered fond memories. "They were good people. I'm proud to have called them family. They taught me losing my family wasn't the end of the world. I could still have my hopes and dreams."

"Were good people?"

"Well they're not dead. But I won't see them ever again. Unless we find magic and I can appear in Andromeda over 600 years from now." Shepard chuckled. 

"Oh." Realization dawned upon him. "They're in the Initiative."

"Yeah, it sounded pretty amazing."

"So, why didn't you join?"

Shepard smiled, "I won't lie to you. I was tempted. But with the reapers… Nobody believed me. I knew it was my duty to stop them."

"Do you think we'll succeed?" James asked the one question to the answer she lied to herself over and over again. She owed it to him to answer honestly.

"I don't know. But we have to try." 

He looked at the glass of his hand. "Thanks for this."

"For what?" Shepard asked puzzled. 

"For this time together. I wouldn't admit it without the alcohol. But I really needed this."

Shepard smiled. She’d needed this too. "We got each other's back, right?"

James returned the smile. "Always." 

**Author's Note:**

> Feel free to come and say hi on [ Tumblr ](https://rpgwrites.tumblr.com/).


End file.
